SUMMARY

The leadership of the KR (Khmer Rouge: Red Khmers) pursued an isolationist nationalist agenda inspired by Stalinist Soviet Union and Mao’s China at the time of the Great Leap Forward and the Cultural Revolution. The leadership was very worried about potential dissent and regularly attacked suspected political rivals outside as well as within the party, especially singling out ethnic Vietnamese and people from eastern Cambodia. Whether the targeting of Vietnamese was based on ideology or for political reasons, attacks on ethnic Vietnamese occurred already in 1971-72, at a time the Khmer Rouge still received significant military support from North Vietnam and the Vietcong. During 1979-89, Vietnam was a secondary warring party helping the Government of Cambodia (Kampuchea)in the Cambodian civil war which led to repeated claims by the Khmer Rouge that the country was occupied by its neighbor.

The Khmer Rouge targeted the civilian population as part of its strategy of guerrilla warfare, but also to control the people in the areas it controlled. Furthermore, the party was almost constantly purging its own ranks to identify potential spies or threats towards the leadership.

KR first became active as a one-sided actor in UCDP data in 1990, when the one-sided violence resulted in at least 25 civilian deaths. The threshold was reached on 22 August that year when KR attacks civilians on a train, causing 53 deaths.